


you’ll get lost (and buried deep)

by IuvenesCor



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: (basically insinuating caleb has DID/split personality disorder), Caleb Widogast Has Issues, Character Study, Gen, Loss, i wanna hug him so bad UGH, tag for S2E26 “Found and Lost”, tw: mental illness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-11-22 03:26:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20867420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IuvenesCor/pseuds/IuvenesCor
Summary: The voice that speaks to you in the dark of morning is a familiar one.Look at these people. What are you doing with them? You should go right now.





	you’ll get lost (and buried deep)

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to this week’s edition of “I had feels at 4am so I wrote 1k words of character study when I was supposed to be sleeping”.
> 
> So this is my take on the little scene of Caleb talking to himself on watch during Found and Lost. The amount of characterization and nuance Liam puts into this man is... wow. Like wow. Honestly one of my favorite characters in any piece of media I’ve seen. And when you tell me that my bby boy Caleb was in an institution and mentally snapped... well, I’ve always been fascinated by dissociative identity disorder/split personalities, so I couldn’t help myself.
> 
> (I just wanna give Caleb a huuuuug ;______;)

You, who fear loss...

No. 

You, who _live_ loss (_lost home, lost virtue, lost friends, lost mind_) hesitate to draw your own blood with this knife too familiar. 

You know how quickly fate turns her face to spit at you once again. It has happened so many times, even your cavernous memory can’t contain the multitude of betrayals. You, who lived a poor but blessed life (loving parents, wholesome virtue, brilliant friends, shining mind) have since become a footstool— once the footstool of a wicked, warped master, and now the footstool of poetic justice.

(_Lost mind lost mind lost mind lost— where did you go?_)

The voice that speaks to you in the dark of morning is a familiar one. It ought to be— after all, it was your cellmate for so many years, your only companion after Breaking. The Caleb that you are not reasons with you, challenges you, reminds you.

_Look at these people. What are you doing with them? You should go right now._

You don’t know how this man, this Caleb that you are not, gets by being so bold. You used to converse with him often in the dark of the asylum cell; he was good to you, once upon a time, the only person who didn’t curse at you for the wailing tears and the manic laughter and all the other demons of action that possessed you. He followed you out of that pit, didn’t abandon you when the great madness receded (though your mind is still lost) and you ran for a new life, even if he did judge you for taking someone else’s life as substitute.

(_Murderer_, the Caleb that you are not whispers. Not always, but often. Not rudely, but matter of fact. Wise. _Correct_.)

_What good are they? How can they help you with what you are trying to do?_

Perhaps he is jealous— jealous of the companionship you have found since. He speaks less since the little one (her, the goblin, Nott, rescuer, _best friend_) came along. She speaks reason enough for all three of you put together; and because she balances you, and you balance her, the Caleb that you are not is left purposeless most of the day. But he knows. He knows things that Nott simply doesn’t understand... or rather refuses to accept. The Caleb that you are not accepts just how twisted and luckless you are.

_You have lost three already. What makes you think you will not lose more?_

He has the better grasp on your tongue right now; once, you both shared willingly, but here outside of the great madness it is a tug of war. (Here, when people are watching, you like to keep your tongue for yourself.) But you are awake and alone on watch for the first time in many weeks, and the fear of letting him speak is not strong enough to bury his words. Besides, even if he did not have your tongue, he still knows how to send echoes through the cavern where your mind used to be.

_Friends_, he hisses inside with disdain while he outwardly speaks logic about your remaining companions, about how they are useless liabilities and why you ought to leave them behind. _You think to call them friends. Stupid._ (That scolding always sounds like Trent, somehow, for a brief and painful moment.) _You know what happens to friends. You know what happens to the ones you love._

_You lose. They lose. Everybody loses._

You think about Fjord, Jester, and Yasha. Good people, if just a bit misunderstanding. (Yasha in particular is good people, good to you, even though she is strange. You even called her friend, _stupid, you are so stupid._) Now they are gone. You can only hope they are not lost for good, but hope is something that was Broken out of you a long time ago. And if you can lose these three strong strangers in a moment, how much more are you likely to lose your one true friend?

It feels like an omen, a cloister bell that rings in noisome dread. _Turn back. Turn back now. Take what you have and run. Don’t bring your curse upon anyone else._ Or maybe that’s just the voice of the Caleb that you are not. He manifests himself in so many ways, it’s hard to keep track.

But even as he warns you of further risk and loss, even as he convinces himself that it’s time you both go, he doesn’t have the power to stir your body into motion. (He lost that ability in the jail cell where Nott found you.) 

You are not fully convinced by his words, no matter their wisdom. The knife has already been plunged into your chest. Fear, the dread of loss, the poison sting of it has already come upon you. 

And yet. 

And yet Beau is so sure. Molly is so sure. Nott is so sure. They are so sure that the missing ones can be rescued. You always defer to the group, and in this case your deference conjures an illusion of hope within you. You have seen what these people can do. You have seen them do wonderful, near miraculous things. If you stay, maybe this rescue mission will work and maybe the other three will be returned. But if you go... if you leave now, if you pull that blade out of your chest, you will lose blood and _everyone_. Not one, not three, but all six. Any chance of ever looking them in the face again will be lost to the ashes of your destructive nature.

You, who live loss...

You, who fear the same...

You stare at the campfire, seeing in the embers phantom flashes of all that has been taken from you, as the Caleb that you are not grows silent.

You remain.

Five minutes.

Two hours.

Daybreak.

You, who have been Broken by loss, are determined to break its curse on you some day.

Let today be that day.


End file.
